Suit filed over Bridgeport classroom voyeurism

By Daniel Tepfer, Staff writer

Published 4:55 am, Tuesday, September 1, 2009

BRIDGEPORT -- The family of an 11-year-old city girl, who police said was secretly photographed by her teacher while she was dressing in a classroom closet, filed suit against the city and the school's principal Monday.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court, claims the principal of Waltersville School, Ann Evans de Bernard, had previously warned the teacher, Thomas Bavedas, against inappropriate conduct with young female students.

"My clients felt violated and are fearful that the photographs or video will appear on the Internet or will be circulated among those who trade in this type of material," said the family's lawyer, Robert Berke.

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This is the first lawsuit filed against the city over the allegation that the teacher secretly photographed nearly a dozen young girls in his classroom. The name of the girl and her family were not disclosed in the lawsuit because of her age.

Bavedas, 39, of Brooklawn Drive, Milford, a former teacher at Waltersville School, is charged with nine counts of voyeurism and nine counts of risk of injury to a minor for allegedly secretly videotaping female students in his classroom. He is also awaiting sentencing in Milford Superior Court after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting a young girl in Milford.

On Jan. 31, he suffered a stroke and was subsequently ruled incompetent to stand trial in the Bridgeport case.

According to police, on May 19, 2008, detectives from the Bridgeport and Milford police departments executed a search warrant at Bavedas' Milford home and found a large amount of child pornography, including video images that appeared to have been taken in a school.

Bavedas, who taught in the Bridgeport school system since August 1999, most recently had been assigned to Waltersville School and its Lighthouse after-school program.

Police said some of the video images taken from Bavedas' home appeared to have been recorded by a camera placed under students' desks, and angled to show the youngsters' genital areas .

Police said they also found at the defendant's home DVDs of an estimated 10 girls, between the ages of 9 and 12, getting undressed and then dressed into Halloween costumes in a closet in Bavedas' classroom at Waltersville School. Police said the video was taken on Oct. 31, 2007.

In June 2008, police said detectives searched Bavedas' classroom and discovered a hole bored into the closet wall that appeared as though it was shaped to hold a video camera. Police said the hole was concealed on the outside of the closet with a bulletin board.

According to the lawsuit, the child's parents were notified last September by the state Department of Children and Families that their daughter was the "subject of inappropriate conduct on the part of defendant Thomas Bavedas." The suit claims videotape taken by police from Bavedas' home shows the girl's naked breast and underwear, as well as a red-and-white multi-colored training bra above her breasts.

"The actions of the defendant were extreme and outrageous. As a direct and proximate result of the acts of the defendant; the plaintiff suffered and continues to suffer severe emotional distress," the suit states.